sister’s—­that was gone!  Not at all disconcerted, he calmly retraced his steps, following his own tracks minutely, with a grim face and a distinct delight in the process, while looking—­perfunctorily—­for the letter.  In the midst of this slow progress a bright idea struck him.  He walked back to the fir-tree where he had rested, and found the lost missive.  It had slipped out of his shirt when he shook himself.  He was not particularly pleased.  He knew that nobody would give him credit for his trouble in going back for it, or his astuteness in guessing where it was.  He heaved the sigh of misunderstood genius, and again started for the post-office.  This time he carried the letters openly and ostentatiously in his hand.

Presently he heard a voice say, “Hey!” It was a gentle, musical voice,—­a stranger’s voice, for it evidently did not know how to call him, and did not say, “Oh, Leonidas!” or “You—­look here!” He was abreast of a little clearing, guarded by a low stockade of bark palings, and beyond it was a small white dwelling-house.  Leonidas knew the place perfectly well.  It belonged to the superintendent of a mining tunnel, who had lately rented it to some strangers from San Francisco.  Thus much he had heard from his family.  He had a mountain boy’s contempt for city folks, and was not himself interested in them.  Yet as he heard the call, he was conscious of a slightly guilty feeling.  He might have been trespassing in following the rabbit’s track; he might have been seen by some one when he lost the letter and had to go back for it—­all grown-up people had a way of offering themselves as witnesses against him!  He scowled a little as he glanced around him.  Then his eye fell on the caller on the other side of the stockade.

To his surprise it was a woman:  a pretty, gentle, fragile creature, all soft muslin and laces, with her fingers interlocked, and leaning both elbows on the top of the stockade as she stood under the checkered shadow of a buckeye.

“Come here—­please—­won’t you?” she said pleasantly.

It would have been impossible to resist her voice if Leonidas had wanted to, which he didn’t.  He walked confidently up to the fence.  She really was very pretty, with eyes like his setter’s, and as caressing.  And there were little puckers and satiny creases around her delicate nostrils and mouth when she spoke, which Leonidas knew were “expression.”

“I—­I”—­she began, with charming hesitation; then suddenly, “What’s your name?”

“Leonidas.”

“Leonidas!  That’s a pretty name!” He thought it did sound pretty.  “Well, Leonidas, I want you to be a good boy and do a great favor for me,—­a very great favor.”

Leonidas’s face fell.  This kind of prelude and formula was familiar to him.  It was usually followed by, “Promise me that you will never swear again,” or, “that you will go straight home and wash your face,” or some other irrelevant personality.  But nobody with that sort of eyes had ever said it.  So he said, a little shyly but sincerely, “Yes, ma’am.”